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Are Canadian environmentalists a terrorist threat?

In a report released yesterday outlining the federal government’s new counter-terrorism strategy, Public Safety Canada listed environmentalists among other “issue-based domestic extremists” that could pose a threat to Canadians.

Responding to the report, Sierra Club Canada director John Bennett said this portrayal is aligned with officials’ attempts to silence environmental groups opposed to major energy projects like the Northern Gateway pipeline.

“We are one of the few segments of Canadian society that has continually stood up to the present Conservative government and been able to be effective at raising issues," said Bennett.
Experts say Fukushima worse than Chernobyl

At least one billion becquerels of radiation continue to leak from Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant each day even though it is now more than five months after the March earthquake and tsunami that damaged the facility.

Experts say that the total radiation leaked will eventually exceed the amounts released from the Chernobyl disaster that the Ukraine in April 1986. This amount would make Fukushima the worst nuclear disaster in history.

Al Jazeera correspondent Steve Chao reports from Tokyo. (WATCH VIDEO)
Japan Prime Minister urges nuclear-free future

In a televised news conference, Mr Kan said the country should harness renewable energy sources.

The 11 March earthquake and tsunami wrecked the Fukushima plant, which continues to leak radioactive material.

A large section of public opinion has turned against nuclear power.

About 30% of Japan's electricity was nuclear generated before the Fukushima crisis, and the country had targeted raising that figure to 53% by 2030.

But Mr Kan had already said this commitment should be scrapped.

On Wednesday, he went a step further, saying: "We will aim at realising a society which can exist without nuclear power."

He said the country should aim to develop alternative energy sources such as solar, wind and biomass.

But he did not lay out a timescale for his plan.
Ottawa’s new anti-terrorism strategy lists eco-extremists as threats

After vowing to take on radical environmentalists determined to stop the Northern Gateway pipeline, the Harper government has released a new anti-terrorism strategy that targets eco-extremists as threats.

With his announcement this week, Public Safety Minister Vic Toews has increased the concern among environmentalists that Ottawa regards them as implacable adversaries to be monitored and battled, rather than well-meaning advocates to be consulted.

“This is just one more step in their attempt to marginalize the environmental movement and to quiet its voice,” John Bennett, executive director of Sierra Club Canada, said Friday. “It’s an indirect suggestion that somehow environmentalism is attached to terrorism and that’s just wrong.”
Senate examines foreign funding of charities

The Conservative government has quietly begun looking into the charitable status of environmental groups in the Senate.

Senator Nicole Eaton is sponsoring an inquiry into what she calls "funding by foreign foundations." Eaton began her debate Tuesday by laying out what she considers to be a threat to the Canadian economy.

"This inquiry is about master manipulators who are operating under the guise of charitable organizations in an effort to manipulate our policies for their own gain," she said in the Upper Chamber.

Environmental groups don't see it that way.

"My fear is that they will just try to smear us and then walk away," said John Bennett, executive director of Sierra Club Canada. "And that they're hoping to frighten off U.S. foundations from supporting us... And they're going to try to turn off the public from supporting us."
Fukushima nuclear plant may have suffered 'melt-through', Japan admits

Molten nuclear fuel in three reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant is likely to have burned through pressure vessels, not just the cores, Japan has said in a report in which it also acknowledges it was unprepared for an accident of the severity of Fukushima.

It is the first time Japanese authorities have admitted the possibility that the fuel suffered "melt-through" – a more serious scenario than a core meltdown.

The report, which is to be submitted to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said fuel rods in reactors No 1, 2 and 3 had probably not only melted, but also breached their inner containment vessels and accumulated in the outer steel containment vessels.
Ontario's plans to store nuclear waste under Lake Huron have Michigan upset

Where does all that nuclear waste go? Unlike in the 1980's when nuclear waste was dumped into oceans, now the preferred method is to bury it somewhere deep. The problem that is no community wants it in their neighbourhood.

One option that has been ignored by goverment and the nuclear industry is above-ground Monitored Retrievable Storage. Instead, the cheapest method - burying the waste deep in old mines - seems to be the only method considered. Not surprisingly, this method saves nuclear companies billions of dollars, not to mention "out of sight, out the mind".
Another Conservative attack on the environment

Media Release
October 20, 2011

Ottawa (20 Oct. 2011) - The Canadian Environmental Network (RCEN) received notice last week that it would not receive $547,000 in core funding that the government had previously said it intended to provide.

The RCEN has existed for more than three decades and includes more than 600 member organizations from across Canada. It provides valuable networking opportunities for grassroots organizations to share knowledge and strategies across this vast country.

Olivier Kolmel, the chairman of the organization's board of directors, said Ottawa did not give any warning that it would cut off its funding next year.

RCEN helps groups move their issues forward and to the attention of lawmakers at all levels of government.
Japan nuclear: Radiation halts water clean-up

Operators of Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant have suspended an operation to clean contaminated water hours after it began due to a rapid rise in radiation.

Some 110,000 tonnes of water have built up during efforts to cool reactors hit by the 11 March earthquake and tsunami.

CLICK HERE TO SEE VIDEO AND ILLUSTRATION
Japan Held Nuclear Data, Leaving Evacuees in Peril

FUKUSHIMA, Japan — The day after a giant tsunami set off the continuing disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, thousands of residents at the nearby town of Namie gathered to evacuate.

Given no guidance from Tokyo, town officials led the residents north, believing that winter winds would be blowing south and carrying away any radioactive emissions. For three nights, while hydrogen explosions at four of the reactors spewed radiation into the air, they stayed in a district called Tsushima where the children played outside and some parents used water from a mountain stream to prepare rice.

The winds, in fact, had been blowing directly toward Tsushima — and town officials would learn two months later that a government computer system designed to predict the spread of radioactive releases had been showing just that.

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